


The Letter

by GlitternGlow



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Discord Challenge, M/M
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-09-15
Updated: 2018-09-15
Packaged: 2019-07-12 18:32:01
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,410
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16000910
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/GlitternGlow/pseuds/GlitternGlow
Summary: Discord Prompt:Write a letter to let a loved one know you need help using a code while in captivity.So Draco is the one in danger, but the Point of view starts with Harry. Might continue this into a few more chapters later on. Writing happens around the letter :)Will add tags/change rating if we get anything going on that requires it but this first chapter is all clean





	The Letter

**Author's Note:**

> So I apologise for the random italics that look so awful. I had a great swirly Draco-esque font picked out on word. poor AO3 and its lack of fonts has me resort to this.

Harry was pacing. He didn’t know what to do next. He was trying to heed Hermione’s advice and not rush in “like a Gryffindor” without using his head, but Draco had been gone for hours.

“He was supposed to be back by now, he promised he said-“

“Harry just breathe mate,” Ron said, laying a comforting hand on his best friend’s shoulder. “I don’t like the git but I can see how much he loves you, if he said he will be back then he will be back. He only went home for something right?”

“Yes Ron, he only went home. Right into the den of Death Eaters and bloody Voldemort!” Harry yelled raising his arms. “I should never have let him go. I should have-“

He stopped as there was a tap on the window and Hermione went over to open it. It wasn’t an owl that any of them recognised but it flew to Harry and waited patiently for him to take the scroll tied to its leg.

He shared a look with the others, the owl shouldn’t have been able to pass the wards of Grimmauld Place if it was holding anything that could hurt them but Harry still took it slowly. When nothing happened he gave the owl a few treats from his pocket and opened the scroll up.

It started,

 _P_ otter,  
_L_ oathe though I am to be corresponding with you, I have deigned to send this letter.  
_E_ veryone thinks you are so perfect, completely without flaw as the Golden boy-who-lived but I can see through it, I know what you are. _A_ complete dunderhead. That’s it, are you listening to me? You oh so noble gryffindor. _S_ lytherins are by far the superior house. _E_ verything you’ve said is wrong. Everything you ever said to me about life was wrong.

 _S_ nape was right though, you are your father’s son. Completely arrogant and completely without a care for those who are not your friends. The Dark Lord is on his way to you. I told him your location in the wood. You cannot even hope to escape. _E_ ven with this warning you are to prepare. He wants a fair duel, unlike the last time when he was robbed of the chance. _N_ agini will stay out of this too I was asked to tell you, though what baring that has on the situation I do not know. Do not call upon _D_ umbledore or all will be lost, just like that time where your face ended up on the end of my fist.

 _H_ eavens above I am starting to write pure drivel now. _E_ very single one of my ancestors will be turning in their portraits, not to mention what _L_ ucius would do if he saw this, though now he will as I doubt the message goes out unread.

 _P_ otter if our rivalry means as much to you as it does to me, then I know you will be steaming right now. Cool off your lion-maned head and think about it for a moment, I know you will make the right choice.

 

Draco

 

Harry finished reading the letter out loud and looked up at his friends. Ron was open mouthed and his face showed what Harry was feeling inside. What was this? 

“What the heck…..”

“Well he’s obviously in trouble and- Harry!” Hermione shouted as Harry had made for the door to the living room. He suddenly found himself bound and on the floor.

The bushy haired girl huffed. “What did it say?” she scolded like Mrs Weasley. “Cool your head and think,” she quoted and Ron picked up the letter and scanned it. 

“Oh look, some of the letters are more…fancy than the others.”

He turned with a look of pride on his face that was rarely seen. “it’s code,” he whispered. “Dad told me about this once but I didn’t listen properly.”

Hermione rolled her eyes with a sigh and let Harry up. “Let’s look together then.”

She laid the letter out on the coffee table in front of the fire but while Ron went over to see what he could help with Harry paced the room back and forth like a caged lion. His head was going a mile a minute at what Draco could be going through. He could be being tortured by Bellatrix, or Voldemort himself and he was just here doing nothing but pacing.

He couldn’t stop however and Ron put a hand on Hermione’s arm when she went to call him over. Harry was running both hands through his hair and the air around him was slowly starting to fill with his raw magic.

“Leave him ‘Mione. If it was you I would be the same until I had a lead.”

“But we need to find the lead Ron, he shouldn’t be doing this to himself,” she said quietly but turned back to the piece of parchment. The owl that had delivered the letter hooted softly and a lamp blew up. 

“Sorry,” Harry’s voice came from the floor behind the sofa where he was now crouched, his hair messed six ways from Sunday and his eyes wide behind his glasses. He stood and banished his magic from the room. It suddenly felt a lot colder.

“I don’t understand it, it doesn’t make any sense. I was never punched by Draco, he was punched by Hermione. Unless you count the train but that was more a kick. And the bit about not caring about people? He always tells me I care too much and should stop it. So, what is it? Its everything backwards of what he is saying? He said the letter will be read, that must be a warning to us to tell us there’s something hidden there and-“ he stopped as Ron took his shoulders. He realised he had been pacing but everything in the room, including Hermione and the owl were floating in a sort of suspended state. Ron smiled.

“Mate,” Ron started, “We need to be calm ok, if Draco is in danger then we don’t want to run off without preparing, especially to the headquarters of all evil. We can do this, and if the adults don’t want to help, then we can run off alone ok? Ok?” he repeated when Harry just watched him. “Just let it go, slowly ok?” 

Harry nodded and carefully placed everything down on the ground again before rubbing the back of his neck and looking to the fire where Hermione was now sitting again with the letter. “Sorry ‘Mione,” he said softly but she wasn’t listening. There was a moment of silence broken by Hermione’s gasp.

“Ron! You said it was something like a code, right? What if its these….fancy ones?” she asked and pointed. Ron knelt down and Harry came over. He pulled a quill out of his pocket and handed it to Ron who was following his finger down the letter and mumbling under his breath. He took the quill and at the bottom of it began to scratch out something. Harry watched, barely breathing as the words came into being.

_PLEASE SEND HELP_

Harry was moving again before Hermione caught his hand and held it tightly. “Kitchen, we can summon everyone there.”

Ron took Harry’s other arm. “She’s right mate, let’s just get as much information as we can.”

Harry turned watery eyes on his friends, “But what if she’s torturing him, what if Voldemort has-“ he choked off, his teeth biting into his lip. “There’s no time to fight with Dumbledore, he won’t send us to meet him, he won’t risk everything for D-Draco.”

Hermione looked upset but resolved. “We tell them Harry. Come on.”

They took him to the kitchen, Ron moving right away to the fireplace while Hermione explained to Remus, Molly and Snape why Harry was teary eyed and what had happened. Snape stood up.

“I am going.”

Before a chorus of objections rang out Harry steeped forward. “Then you take me wit-“

He screamed then, his hand flying to his scar as his body crumpled to the floor. Snape caught him and eased him down. “Harry! Can you hear me?” his voice was more frantic than usual. He knew if this was a vision there would only be one cause. Harry couldn’t breathe, he knew as he opened his eyes he would see something he didn’t want to see.

“Draco.”


End file.
